


New Girl Cupcake-Sized Fics

by touchedglitter



Category: New Girl
Genre: Gen, Musicals, romcom
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-09-09
Updated: 2015-06-23
Packaged: 2017-12-26 03:20:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 2,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/960980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/touchedglitter/pseuds/touchedglitter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>These are just little bits of fic that I have written here and there. Most haven't been beta'd.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I've got your once more with feeling right here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The one where Jess's life is a Broadway musical.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a fill for [blithers's request](http://dollsome.livejournal.com/1905116.html?thread=15560668#t15560668) in the dollsome GET YOUR ROM COM ON comment ficathon.

Jess’s eyes feel a little gritty when she wakes up. Nick is snoring softly beside her. She turns on her stomach and stretches, back arched like a cat, and her hand brushes against something plasticy feeling under the pillow. She grabs it and pulls it out, eyes widening as she realizes it’s a bag of Jolly Ranchers. She had kind of hoped the pretzel in the bed was an anomaly, but it looks like Nick’s got a better snack stash in his bedroom than Claudia Kishi ever had.

“Hey, Nick,” she tries to whisper, but instead sings. That’s weird. Usually when she sings it’s pretty intentional. “Nick. I just found Jolly Ranchers in your bed.” More singing.

He turns over. “You can have some if you want, just let me sleep.” Nick is singing back. Jess smiles broadly.

“You’re siiiiiiiiiing-iiiiiiiiiing!” She reaches her hands to his sides to tickle him. He sits up, startled, and bats her hands away.

“No, I’m nooooooooooot!” He looks sincerely freaked out as the sound comes out of him, and it actually sounds good, like Nick Miller has this secret good voice he’s been hiding under his “Time of My Life” and “Groove is in the Heart” squawking.

“I think it’s nice.” She notices that these are more tone poems than actual songs - there’s no structure or refrain. Nothing seems to rhyme. Maybe that will change as they get better at this.

“I’m not doing this on purpose, Jess. It’s some kind of supernatural - I saw a Buffy episode about this - there’s an amulet? I think I have to marry a demon? Or maybe you have to marry a demon - I really don’t want either of us to marry a demon, Jess.” He’s grabbed her shoulders now and is giving her his patented Nick Miller intense eyes.

“If the singing is bothering you so much, I have an idea!” Nick raises his eyebrows. He’s looking for a genuine solution here. But when she straddles him and kisses him with all the force that a still-sleepy shocked-by-her-new-musical-life woman can muster, he doesn’t complain. “If we’re not trying to talk, then we probably won’t sing.” This time she successfully sing-whispers.

He grabs her hips and pulls her closer to him. “I’m willing to try it,” he growls in his delightful new baritone. He quickly flips her over onto her back, bending down to kiss her but bumping his forehead against hers instead. “That wasn’t as smooth a move as I’d hoped.” He seems a bit more relaxed now, like maybe being a good singer makes singing a more acceptable past time. He comes in for a kiss again, and this time he sticks the landing.

===

“Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiick!” The long, high note floats out from Nick’s room.

“Is she rehearsing an aria in there?” Schmidt, sitting at the table after having silently finished his morning omelet, says to Winston. Winston just looks at him. “What?” Schmidt asks.

“You just sang that.” Winston puts his hand to his chest. “I’m singing, too. What the hell is this?”

“I’ve been practicing for this moment my whole life.” Schmidt smiles and goes to his room to get his tap shoes, as Winston looks on in horror.


	2. Bright and Breezy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick learns something new about Jess.

When he gets home from the bar, she’s sitting on the couch. Her hair is up in a messy bun with a purple pen stuck through it. She’s staring intently at a stack of papers in her right hand. 

It looks like she hasn’t changed out of her first-day-of-school dress since getting home from work. It’s got these little bubble looking polka dots all over it. 

With her hair up, her pretty dress, the pen, the papers, the glasses, and this intense little pensive scowl, she’s like something out of a goddamned hot-for-teacher fantasy.

And she’s sitting cross-legged. So of course he can’t help but glance up her skirt. It’s just who he is. He sees a navy blue ruffle, pretty far down her thigh, almost to her knee.

“Jess?” He calls her name tentatively. It’s a voice he’s been cultivating pretty much since the day he met her. It’s a little bit like the voice you might use to soothe a tiger you thought was going to eat you, or a toddler you didn’t want to upset. If you could use one voice for both those things.

She looks up at him and smiles. “Oh, hi, Nick. I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Yeah, I can see you’re really focused on those papers.” He crosses to her, dropping his keys on the table as he passes, and sits opposite her on the couch. “I don’t think we turned anything in on the first day when I was in school.”

“These are getting-to-know you surveys. I try to come up with a good comment to write on each one so the kids know I’ve actually read them.” She takes the pen out of her hair and writes something on the top paper in the stack, smiling as she does. Then she sticks the pen back in her hair.

“Jess, I’m gonna ask you a question. And I want you to know that I’m not judging you. I’m just asking out of curiosity.” Sometimes, she can be skittish. Sometimes, she gets defensive. And that’s probably because, sometimes, he’s a dick, and she’s just reacting to that.

“Mmmkay.” She flips to the next page.

“Jessica,” he says with new gravity, “are you wearing Victorian bloomers?”

She looks up at him, her eyes wide. “Yes,” she squeaks. “Sometimes at school I want to do a cartwheel for the kids and it’s hard in a dress. Don’t make fun.”

He nods to himself and then shakes his head. This girl. He looks her dead in the eye. 

“Lady, the day I make fun of your underthings is the day I - yeah, I don’t have a good way to finish that.” He gets up and kisses her on the top of her head, then starts walking toward his bedroom. 

“When you’re done responding to those surveys, maybe we can do our own getting-to-know-you activity.” His wink is wasted on her. She is really serious about this work.

“Okay.” She pulls the pen out and writes another comment.

“And be prepared to show a little ankle.” She looks at him, startled for a second, and then laughs. And with that, his work is done. For now.


	3. After "The Captain"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick hasn't been acting like a best friend to Schmidt. It's about time he did.

After a very successful lovemaking session (why not call it what it is?), when Jess is mumbling in her sleep nestled against his side, Nick thinks about Schmidt. And friendship. And that goddamn cookie. He can’t let his best friend in the whole world sit on the couch in estrogen-soaked agony. Even if that best friend has been trying to break up the best thing that’s ever happened to him. Even if his girlfriend (his girlfriend!) insists that his best friend was in the wrong here.

Friends don’t let friends cry alone. Except when they do. But he’s not going to, this time.

As gently as possible, he slides out from under Jess, replacing his own body with an extra pillow (just like Indiana Jones, bam!). He pulls the cover right up under her chin and tiptoes out to the living room.

Schmidt is still on the couch, still wrapped in that blanket, staring into space with red-rimmed eyes.

“Hey, buddy,” Nick says. He won’t lie, he’s a little bit afraid of this conversation. But that’s what this whole talking about feelings thing is about, conversations like this, so he’s gonna give it a shot. He sits down next to Schmidt. “Ya wanna talk about it?”

“No,” Schmidt spits at him. They sit in silence for a few minutes. “You smell like sex, Nicholas. Just leave me alone.”

“I’m gonna - I’m gonna go take a shower and then I’ll be right back.” Nick heads to the bathroom. He takes a quick shower, just like he said he would. As he’s getting out and wrapping the towel around his waist, he realizes that the only clothes he has in here are the dirty ones he just took off. And he doesn’t want to go back to his room yet, for fear of waking Jess.

So he’s gonna have this conversation with his best friend while wearing only a towel.

Well, the towel covers more than Schmidt’s kimono does, so he’s probably safe.

“Okay, man, I’m clean. Sex-smell free. Let’s rap.” He sits by Schmidt again.

Schmidt sighs heavily. There is a palpable awkwardness in the air. Nick realizes he really should have put on some pants before trying this.

“I didn’t want to hurt anybody, Nick,” Schmidt finally begins. “I love both of those women. Cece has a peace and wisdom the likes of which I’ve never seen, not to mention her flawless body, and she’s somehow fiery in spite of being so peaceful. And Elizabeth… She doesn’t care what people think, and I value that, I really do. She’s so different from me, and it’s good. It’s complementary, you know?”

“Like, free?” Nick regrets the words as soon as they come out of his mouth.

“It’s late and I’m sad, so I’m going to let that slide.” Schmidt sighs again, then continues. “I wasn’t two-timing them for myself. It was for them. Why can’t Jess see that?”

Nick hesitates. It would be so easy to explain that Cece is Jess’s best friend, so of course she’s going to take Cece’s side. And then he has a tiny personal revelation: Schmidt is his best friend. But Nick hasn’t been treating him like it. Nick has had new-love (did he say love? he’s going to own it, privately, at least, maybe not out loud) goggles on, following Jess’s lead maybe because she controls his boob supply or maybe because he thought she was right - but now those goggles have shattered and he sees what’s really been going on here: His best friend is hurting, just as badly as the two women he duped, and Nick hasn’t been there.

He remembers Schmidt’s voicemail… that he ignored… about how he really needed his best friend.

Nick’s been going about this all wrong. Bros before… Jess isn’t a ho, but. Bros. Yeah.

“I won’t lie to you man, it sucks,” Nick says. It’s the best he can come up with on the fly while also trapped in his own thoughts. “This world is rough.”

“I think I might feel better if you would just - no, it’s stupid. You won’t do it.” Schmidt sniffles.

“What, man? Anything for my best friend. I know I’ve been rough on you. I’m sorry. What can I do?”

“If you would just - hold me?” Schmidt’s voice is barely audible.

“Sure… buddy…” Nick stretches his arm out. Schmidt buries his face in Nick’s bare chest. Nick’s eyes grow wide. Astrodome wide. This is really not where Nick imagined this going.

“God, it’s like a thicket,” Schmidt mumbles against him. “You certainly don’t have Cece’s majestic breasts, Nick.” Nick imagines for a minute that he does. He wouldn’t leave his bedroom. Ever. “But your skin is shockingly smooth for someone who has no skin care regimen to speak of.”

“I have a regimen,” Nick objects. “I wash it with soap and everything.” This is - well, it’s not as awkward as he thought it would be. And not as gay, either. In spite of a man’s face being buried in his naked chest, Nick still feels really strongly attracted to women in general, and Jess in particular.

“Just hold me in silence, Nicholas,” Schmidt rasps. So Nick does.


	4. Schmidt's Not There

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's not that Nick doesn't imagine his future with Jess. He just can't talk to her about it.

It’s not that Nick doesn’t ever think about that stuff. It’s that he doesn’t tell people he thinks about that stuff. He’s a writer, so he’s got a good imagination, and there’s a hundred ways it could go. In one version, he and Jess move to Chicago and they get a house next door to his brother and their kids all play together. And it’s great, everything about this version is great, except: Schmidt’s not there.

And then there’s a version strikingly close to hers: they’re in Portland, he takes and passes the Oregon Bar (he kinda wishes now that he’d walked at his law school graduation and told anybody about it at all, especially his mom who would be so proud) and then he finds some funky legal clinic to work in and mentors kids like him who hate the other law school assholes and they all work together to save the world. He’s seen Portlandia a lot (Jess says it’s not that funny, it’s just *true*) and he thinks he could really like it there. The 90s was a good time for him, all long hair and flannel shirts. They probably have a lot of lawyers with long hair in Portland, but there’s also probably room for one more.

But this vision always comes to a halt when he remembers: Schmidt’s not there.

So how do you explain to your girlfriend (correction: ex-girlfriend) that the reason you are scared to commit to a future with her is that it means your best friend won’t be there? It’ll just open you up to a fight. It happened with Caroline time and again: she needed him to be someplace, Schmidt had a crisis, he couldn’t be there for Caroline because he had to be there for Schmidt.

He needs to be there for Schmidt not for Schmidt, but for him. He knows who he is when he’s with Schmidt. It’s a good feeling. It feels right.

He’s already had the fight with Jess thousands of times in his head. Easier to skip it for real. Plus, he’s seen enough TV to know that this breakup won’t last. They’ll get back together eventually, and by then maybe she’ll be ready to live in a future that includes Schmidt. Uncle Schmidt, teaching their kids valuable lessons about women and walking capes.


	5. The Name of the Nick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick's name is kinda weird sometimes.

Do you ever get that feeling that your name isn’t yours? Sometimes it happens to Nick Miller. Everybody in the loft has their own way of saying it.

When he’s pissed Jess off… it’s “Neeeyuck!”

When Schmidt’s not feeling fancy enough to call him Nicholas, but is still obviously disappointed in him… it’s almost “Neck.”

Coach seems to laugh every time he says it, aspirating a little. “Nhick.”

And Winston is the most matter-of-fact about it. “Hey, Nick.”

Maybe Winston is the only one who knows his true name.

Does that give Winston a special power over him?

These are the things Nick Miller thinks about when he’s alone and hungry.


	6. The Return of Pepperwood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick gets a typewriter.

Jess is standing at the kitchen island, stirring a cup of tea steeping with catnip leaves from the plant she's growing on the roof - half for her, half for Birdcat, half for Ferguson - no, that's too many halves - when Nick backs into the loft, a giant monstrosity of an orange typewriter in his arms, grunting under its weight. She casually checks her watch, starting the thirty second countdown in her mind. This is their new rule since the cruise - they can't be alone together for more than 30 seconds at a time. When the 30 seconds is up, if somebody else hasn’t joined them, one of them has to leave.

"Hi, Nick, " she chirps a tad too brightly, smiling her big creepy everything-is-normal-nothing’s-weird-what-are-you-talking-about smile at him.

He unceremoniously dumps the typewriter on the island. "Look at this thing. Isn't it amazing? I was just driving through a ritzy neighborhood in Santa Monica with Coach, making up goofy stories about the rich jerks that must live there, and this was sitting out on the sidewalk by some guy’s trash! Can you believe somebody would get rid of this? "

" Yes?" She winces. She's trying a new thing where she's honest with him about his ideas. But he must have meant it as a rhetorical question, because he just keeps going.

“I always thought the problem with my writing was that I didn’t use a typewriter. Computers have no soul, Jess. I’m gonna be a real writer now! I need some coffee. Coffee spiked with vodka.”

And it’s time. “I have to go… plan for the thing.” She starts toward her room.

“I’m gonna thank you in the acknowledgments of my first book. For always believing in me.” The scary part is that Nick says this in all earnestness, with no trace of sarcasm.

“Cool. Have fun with your vintage writing machine!” And she retreats, leaving Nick hugging the typewriter and whispering sweet nothings to its feed roller.

\--

When she cracks the door to her room a couple hours later, she finds a coffee-stained, crumpled up envelope taped to it. The paper inside the envelope is incongruously crisp. It only has one sentence on it:

`Julius Pepperwood might have solved the mystery of the Zombie Zoo, but he hadn't solved the mystery of his own heart. `


	7. The Quarter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nick's had that quarter in his pocket since the beginning.

“Hey, Nick?” Kai asks, her hands inside the pocket of his hoodie. That she’s wearing. It’s very sexy when a girl wears your hoodie.

“Yeah?”

“Can I use this quarter?” She pulls it out and holds it between her thumb and index finger.

“What? No!” He snatches it out of her hand. How had he left that in his hoodie? It’s supposed to be on him at all times. This rich devilwoman consulting witch, whom he thinks is totally great though, shouldn’t be touching that quarter.

“Okay. Weirdo.” Her attention drifts back to the It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia marathon.

He breathes a sigh of relief that she doesn’t seem to care why he’s so weirdly possessive of that quarter.


End file.
